سلام اين مطلب را در ارلاينرز ديدم گفتم بجاي ايجاد تاپيك در ادامه ي همين مبحث بياورم A Forgotten Tragedy in Iran
By Ethan Rider
December 26, 2009 the Iran-Iraq war or the 1980s, the U.S. Navy maintained a powerful presence in the Persian Gulf in an effort to protect “freedom of navigation” in the region, mostly in the form of oil shipments to Japan and the United States.[SUP]1[/SUP] On May 17, 1987, while operating under that objective, the USS Stark was attacked by an Iranian F-1 Mirage fighter jet, and 37 U.S. sailors were killed.[SUP]2[/SUP] An investigation into the incident revealed that the captain of the USS Stark, Glenn R. Brindel, had ample time to defend his ship against the attack. In fact, the Iraqi jet had been continuously tracked for more than 20 minutes, but by the time the captain identified it as a threat, there was not sufficient time to defend the ship.[SUP]3[/SUP] Captain Brindel and his weapons officer were able to avoid being court-martialed by accepting responsibility for the incident and leaving the Navy. However, they were severely criticized by the Navy for “failing to defend [the] ship.”[SUP]4[/SUP] In light of the attack, the United States imposed “new rules of engagement, … to allow captains to tighten their fingers on the trigger,” and to “fire before being fired upon.”[SUP]5[/SUP]
USS Stark, May 1987
July 1988, three Navy ships, the USS Vincennes, the USS Elmer Montgomery and the USS Sides, were patrolling the Persian Gulf, enforcing a U.S. imposed embargo of Iran. On the morning of July 3, the USS Elmer Montgomery reported enemy fire coming from small boats of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). The USS Vincennes traveled to the scene of the conflict, assumed command of the confrontation, and engaged in battle with the IRGC boats from 10:13am to 10:33am. The skirmish forced the Vincennes crew to perform a series of swift maneuvers to combat the much smaller and more maneuverable boats of the IRGC. The intensity of the battle mixed with the severe rocking of the cruiser created a scene of chaos onboard, yet amidst the confusion, the Vincennes effectively detected, warned, and shot down an attacking Iranian F-14 fighter jet.[SUP]6[/SUP]
USS Vincennes, Firing a SAM Missile, 1985
At 10:17am, on July 3, 1988, Iran Air Flight 655, operating an Airbus A-300 (EP-IBU), departed Bandar Abbas Airport in Iran, for a brief flight over the Persian Gulf to Dubai, United Arab Emirates. After takeoff, Flight 655 was instructed by Air Traffic Control (ATC) to activate its aircraft identification transponder, and did so (the transponder aboard the Airbus ‘squawks Mode III,’ identifying the aircraft as neutral and civilian).[SUP]7[/SUP] A few minutes later, ATC cleared Flight 655 to climb from 7,000 to 12,000 feet.[SUP]8[/SUP] Then, a transmission came through to Flight 655; a serious warning from the USS Stark.”[SUP]9[/SUP] Thirty-nine seconds later, two surface-to-air missiles were fired at the Iranian passenger jet, both of which struck the aircraft, breaking off the tail and one of the wings.[SUP]10[/SUP] The Washington Post explains, “Such a missile hit usually slices an aircraft apart and turns it into a fireball of burning fuel.”[SUP]11[/SUP]
© Werner Fischdick
Three hours after combat ceased, the crew of the USS Vincennes learned that the aircraft they had shot out of the sky was not a hostile Iranian F-14, as they thought, but a commercial aircraft, Flight 655, carrying 290 people, all of whom perished.[SUP]12[/SUP]
United States immediately defended the actions of the USS Vincennes, and its Captain, Will C. Rogers, 3d. In justification, the United States cited flaws in the procedures of the Iran Air flight crew, and errors reported by the USS Vincennes’ AEGIS radar system. The arguments presented by the United States included:
•The USS Vincennes and the USS Sides tried numerous times, on both civilian and military radio frequencies, to contact Flight 655, in an attempt to warn it of the danger it was in; Flight 655 did not respond to any of the warnings.[SUP]13[/SUP]
•The USS Vincennes’ AEGIS radar system indicated that Flight 655 was
‘squawking Mode II,’ which identified it as an enemy aircraft.[SUP]14[/SUP]
•The USS Vincennes’ AEGIS radar system indicated that Flight 655 was aimed at the USS Vincennes, accelerating and descending, giving it “a threatening profile.”[SUP]15[/SUP]
•Flight 655 flew four to five miles outside of its designated non-military corridor, and into a war zone.[SUP]16[/SUP]
Based on these statements, President Reagan called the incident a tragic, yet “understandable accident,” and announced that there would be no change in U.S. policy regarding the Persian Gulf.[SUP]17[/SUP] Iranian officials declared it a “barbaric massacre of innocent passengers”.[SUP]18[/SUP] It would quickly become clear that all of the explanations offered by the United States were flawed, and that the crew of the USS Vincennes was solely to blame for the tragedy.
Initially, the United States cited errors reported by the AEGIS radar system as contributing factors to the misidentification of Flight 655; peculiar because the Navy touted AEGIS, “the most advanced radar detection and tracking system in the world.”[SUP]19[/SUP] It was soon revealed that AEGIS was, in fact, a very advanced system, and had reported no errors; all ‘radar’ errors were actually errors made by the crew misreading the radar data. The fact that Flight 655 was aimed at the USS Vincennes contributed to its ‘threatening profile,’ but it was revealed by the U.S. Defense Department that this occurred because, to combat the Iranian boats, the USS Vincennes navigated its way into the 20-mile-wide commercial aviation corridor, and only a few miles from the centerline.[SUP]20[/SUP] An official Pentagon inquiry into the disaster reported that Flight 655 was “on a normal commercial air flight plan profile; in the assigned airway; squawking transmitting Mode III, … and on a continuous ascent from takeoff at Bandar Abbas to shootdown.”[SUP]21[/SUP]
Radar errors exonerated, the fact that Flight 655 failed to respond to the Navy’s repeated warnings could still render Iran culpable for the tragedy. The United States warned that civilian airliners “must identify themselves and state their intentions when challenged by American warships.”[SUP]22[/SUP] However, it was discovered that many of the warnings issued to Flight 655 were made on the military air distress channel, which was inaccessible to the commercial jet. Also, Flight 655 was in continuous communication with ATC, and therefore unable to hear the warnings issued on the civil aviation distress frequency. Regardless, most of the warnings were directed to “Iranian F-14” or “Iranian fighter.”[SUP]23[/SUP] The International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) determined that of the four warnings issued on the civilian aviation distress frequency, only one was clear enough to be “instantly recognizable” to the flight crew that it was directed at them. This transmission was made 39 seconds before the USS Vincennes fired.[SUP]24[/SUP]
The U.S. Navy was responsible for the primary investigation into the disaster, and found that the central cause arose from the USS Vincennes’ crew misreading radar data and convincing themselves that what they saw on the radar was not an Airbus A-300, but a hostile F-14.[SUP]25[/SUP] Incredibly, the Navy determined that the “psychological stress [from] being in combat” was to blame for the errors made by the crew, and that the crew itself was not at fault.[SUP]26[/SUP] The Navy declared that no one would even be disciplined for the mistake, including Captain Rogers, despite the Navy protocol that holds the captain accountable for all of the actions of his ship. The Navy went so far as to withdraw its only official dissenting document, a non-punitive letter of censure addressed to a middle-grade officer who relayed misleading information during the incident.[SUP]27[/SUP]
Carry Coffins Through the Streets of Tehran, July 7,
after the United States was implicated for the disaster, Iran was shown little sympathy. Admiral William J. Crowe, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, declared, “Iran must bear the principal responsibility for the tragedy,” and called the flight crew’s actions “significantly negligent.”[SUP]28[/SUP] Charles Brands, a gunner’s mate aboard the USS Vincennes stated, “I personally don’t feel guilty because I think it helped shorten the war and a lot of lives were saved.”[SUP]29[/SUP] Senator John Warner (R.-Va.) declared that Captain Rogers “acted professionally and properly at the information at his disposal, …he had to make that decision.”[SUP]30[/SUP] Captain Rogers asserted, “We did what we had to do when we had to do it.”[SUP]31[/SUP] Vice President Bush blamed the Iranians for the tragedy, saying, it “was an irresponsible and tragic error… [to allow] a civilian aircraft loaded with passengers to proceed on a path over a warship engaged in battle.”[SUP]32[/SUP] Bush also expressed, “If I was in the captain’s shoes, I probably would have done exactly the same thing he did.”[SUP]33[/SUP] Bush would later declare, specifically in reference to this tragedy,
“I will never apologize for the United States—I don’t care what the facts are.”[SUP]34[/SUP]

of Flight 655 Victims in an Iranian Morgue, July 5 response to the tragedy, the United States issued radios capable of monitoring ATC transmissions (to assist in identifying civilian aircraft as such) to all warships stationed in the Persian Gulf.[SUP]35[/SUP] Additionally, the United States paid $131.8 million in compensation to citizens of Iran, but under the non-negotiable terms that relatives received only $250,000 if a family breadwinner was killed, and $100,000 if a non-working family member was killed. Furthermore, the United States insisted that all payments must be made ‘ex gratia,’ meaning that, under international law, no guilt is placed on the United States. These compensatory payments were not made until 1996, eight years after the incident.[SUP]36[/SUP]
In 1989, The U.S. Navy awarded Captain Rogers and Lieutenant Commander Scott E. Lustig the ‘Legion of Merit,’ the second highest peacetime award, “for exceptionally meritorious conduct in the performance of outstanding service.” The destruction of an airliner with 290 civilians aboard was not mentioned at the ceremony.[SUP]37[/SUP]
The cockpit voice recorder and flight data recorder, typically essential to crash investigations and vehemently tracked down, were never recovered, and remain in the Persian Gulf today.[SUP]38[/SUP] جهت پرهيز از شلوغي صفحه لطفا منابع را از لينك بيابيد
با تشكر از شما
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